Courses

Courses

101 Introduction to Spanish I (3 credits) This is a beginner's course using the communicative method that will emphasize the acquisition of grammatical structures and vocabulary through an active process of participation; it will focus on listening comprehension, correct pronunciation and cultural knowledge. Spanish will be the language of instruction. Students are expected to attend regularly and participate in all class activities. Prerequisite: Course is designed for students who have had no previous experience in Spanish, and students who have had less than two years of Spanish in high school. 102 Introduction to Spanish II (3 credits) A continuation of Span 101, which focuses on the active development of listening and reading comprehension, cultural knowledge and speaking and writing skills. Cultural topics may include: Types and Stereotypes, the Human Community, and Views on Death. Spanish will be the language of instruction. Students are expected to attend regularly and participate in all class activities. Prerequisite: Span 101; students with two or more years of Spanish in high school with Spanish faculty approval and placement exam. 160 Topics in Hispanic Studies (3 credits) Stresses the unique historical, linguistic, cultural and traditional differences of individual areas of the Hispanic world. Normally this course will be offered during the term preceding the trip abroad and will deal with the area to be visited. Students may repeat the course when content and title change.

200 Intermediate Spanish Abroad (4 credits) This course will offer students an opportunity to reinforce and expand previous learning in grammar, comprehension, oral and written skills, and vocabulary. It will offer students with more than two years of high school Spanish an opportunity to finish their language requirement provided that they have passed Spanish 102 or equivalent, and they pass the placement exam for this level. 201 Intermediate Spanish I (3 credits) This course offers the student an opportunity to reinforce and expand previous learning in grammar, comprehension, oral and written skills, and vocabulary. Unlike previous courses, this course focuses upon giving the student an idiomatic grasp of the language. Oral and written practice and weekly language laboratory exercises. Span 201 should be taken the semester immediately following Span 102. Prerequisite: Span 102, with Spanish faculty approval and placement exam. 202 Intermediate Spanish II (3 credits) This intermediate level course is the gatekeeper which will determine if students will be invited to pursue advanced studies in Spanish. This course will go more in depth in grammatical points in order to help students manipulate them with more precision in written and oral assignments. Students will be exposed to a variety of written, visual and audio texts, and they will relate them to their historical, social and cultural contexts. Oral proficiency is strongly emphasized. A final grade of B+ is required in order to continue towards a major. Prerequisite: Span 201, with Spanish faculty approval and placement exam. 203 Review of Spanish Grammar (3 credits) This course will emphasize a review of Spanish grammar, with particular focus on verb tenses, agreement (adjectives, nouns, articles, etc.), pronounce, accents, idioms, and the structure of sentences. The course will also focus on the continued development of vocabulary, grammatical as well as everyday usage. Finally, students will apply their study of grammar and apply it to the analysis of films, short newspaper readings and written compositions. Oral and written proficiency will be strongly emphasized. 205 Communicative Spanish (3 credits) This course emphasizes the analysis of grammar on written works. Students will learn advance grammar and will apply concepts learnt during the semester to written texts in order to analyze them from a grammatical point of view. Thus, they will investigate how grammar determines the way a text creates meaning, conveys images, insinuates hidden messages, and creates emotional and psychological realities. Prerequisite: Span 202 or permission of professor. 240 Spanish for Healthcare Personnel (3 credits) A course and materials designed to bridge the communication gap between the large Spanish-speaking population and English-speaking healthcare team that treats them. This course focuses upon developing the oral skills of the Spanish language, as well as vocabulary related to health-related fields. Except when prevented by extraordinary circumstances, this course should be taken in the semester immediately following Span 102. Taught in Spanish. Prerequisite: Span 102, and students who have had three or more years of Spanish in high school with Spanish department faculty approval and/or placement test. 250, 350, 450 Seminar in Hispanic Studies (3 credits) A seminar in a selected topic of Spanish language, literature, or civilization. Occasionally the course is taught in English. 285/485 Spanish Term Abroad (4 credits) A study abroad program offered by the Spanish section of the language department. 300 Puntos de vista (3 credits) With the use of a variety of written texts and films, this course is designed to help students speak and write Spanish by manipulating more sophisticated grammar and vocabulary when presenting and supporting their opinions on a variety of cultural, social and historical issues. Taught in Spanish. Prerequisite: Permission of professor required. 301 Análisis del discurso escrito (3 credits) The combined use of text and film sets the background to understand specific socio-historical issues in the Hispanic World. As students broaden their vocabulary and learn more advanced grammar concepts, they are expected to teach them to others, and to show precision in manipulating them in their written and oral work. This course also offers an introduction in analyzing written discourse of literary texts to prepare students for more advanced literary courses. Taught in Spanish. 303 Estudio de la traducción I (3 credits) In this course students will be introduced to many of the mechanics of translating. Translation will be from Spanish to English and it will include short texts. There will be an emphasis on texts or fragments of texts that expose specific problems of how to translate certain expressions from Spanish to English. It will also give a very strong emphasis on how to translate prepositions, the impersonal voice, order of sentences, punctuation and verbal tenses. 317 La guerra civil española: cine/literatura(3 credits) The Spanish Civil War, which took place between 1936 and 1939, had a great impact in the way that Spain developed in the following decades. Today one can find the vestiges and influences from that period in the art, film and literature. These forms of artistic expression reflect the fear, the lack of confidence and a search for an individual and national identity. Through the analysis of film and literature during and about that period in Spanish history, we will study the events that led Spain into a period of seclusion from the rest of Europe. What were the causes of the Spanish Civil War? What political, social, and religious groups participated? Who did they support during the war? What were the consequences of the war? In what ways were men, women, children, and gays/lesbians affected during the war and its aftermath, the Francoist period? (MWL) 319 La cultura popular (3 credits) Through the analysis of telenovelas, music, and film, we will discuss what these modes of popular culture say about particular society. We will look at how these forms of cultural expressions convey conflicts between classes, gender and ethnic groups, and how these popular cultural productions say about the relationship between a specific society in the Spanish speaking world and the outside world. The texts for this course will be the forms of popular cultures themselves to provide students the opportunity to create with the language. (NTW) 329 Nacionalismo y sexualidad (3 credits) This course will focus on the study and analysis of gender and sexuality in contemporary Latin American societies, with a particular emphasis on how writers such as Reinaldo Arenas, Rosario Ferré, Jaime Bayly construct/de-construct societal notions of acceptable gender behavior. Through the use of film and literary works we will discuss issues pertaining to the formation of identity and how the development of this form of identification in various Latin American countries is affected based on the relationship between sexuality, a sense of pride in one's origin and societal expectations. We will examine and discuss topics that focus on issues relating to the relationship between men and women with an overview of the treatment of sexuality from colonialism to the present to understand the current conditions that have constructed gender dichotomies. (SBA or NTW) 330 Ultimas noticias (3 credits) By reading the news in a variety of Spanish newspapers online, students will familiarize themselves on what is happening throughout the Hispanic World, and how that part of the world presents American news. The written and oral work produced during the semester will have to demonstrate precision in manipulating advanced grammar and ease when creating with the language. 331 Escritores españoles contemporáneos (3 credits) In this course, students will examine contemporary literature from Spain, including the novel, drama, poetry, and the essay. Topics studied will include the Spanish Civil War, the Franco period, and current post-Franco writing. All texts will be read for their literary, cultural and historical values. (MWL) 332 La E.T.A. (3 credits) In this course we will study the history of the E.T.A. in Spain, the Spanish movement against the 'terrorist' group, E.T.A. and the press, the victims of the E.T.A., among other topics. 333 El cuento latinoamericano (3 credits) A study of a wide variety of contemporary Spanish American authors who have left an important legacy as representatives of different trends, movements and genres, with special emphasis on their historical contexts. A close analysis on structure, discourse and grammatical elements will serve as the basis for analyzing other forms of literary texts. (NTW) 335 El cine hispánico (3 credits) In this course, students will analyze several representative films from Spain and Latin America by such directors as Bunuel, Almodovar, Gutierrez Alea, Littin, Bemberg, and Solas. All films will be studied as social, historical, and cultural texts. Taught in Spanish. (NTW) 400 Teoría para las humanidades (3 credits) The question that we will address in this course is how the psychoanalytic and the artistic process or experience overlap. We will do so by reading a series of articles that bridge the distance between the sciences and the arts, and we will focus especially on the similarities and differences between trauma and the creative process. The objective of this course is to introduce students to the writings of philosophers and scientists of the 20th Century whose works have influenced the world of literature and literary criticism. In this course, we will not read literary works, rather, we will read theoretical ones in order to acquire the tools that may enable us to start understanding one recurrent theme that runs across most cultures throughout the 20th Century - trauma (produced by violent and destructive events such as wars, economic upheavals, social disturbances, sexual abuses, gender inequalities, etc.) and its connection to art (creation, construction and mastery), including the most of all arts, the art of living. Most of the texts for the course will be in Spanish unless a translation into Spanish is not available. 403 Estudio de la traducción II (3 credits) In this course we will translate a wide variety of sophisticated Spanish texts into English. Those texts will belong not only to different countries and cultures, but also to different historical periods. They will include literary texts, poetry, philosophy, history, and economics, among others. Translation will be used as a tool to more deeply understand the original text and to compare the realities created by the original language to those of English. Students will also be exposed to various theoretical texts on translation. 420 España del medievo al siglo XIX (3 credits) In this course we will study the following topics: Muslim Spain, the Reconquest, The Catholic Monarchs, the 'Discovery' of America, the Rise and Fall of the Spanish Empire, the Bourbons and the Enlightenment, the Peninsular War and the Constitution of 1812, the 19th Century and the loss of Colonies. 425 Lorca y Hernandez (3 credits) In this course students will read the written work by Federico Garcia Lorca and Miguel Hernandez. They will also learn about the historical situation during both writers' lives, their biographies, and that of other writers and artists of their time. Students will also use a variety of related materials such as films, audio materials and documentaries. (MWL) 430 Medios de difusión (3 credits) Language is not neutral and the written media conveys different interpretations of facts. By analyzing the written discourse and the way the same news is printed in different newspapers, students will learn to become aware of the different tones, tendencies and editorial agendas. Commercial media will be compared to the independent press, as well as Hispanic to American Press. 431 La diáspora latina en los EE.UU. (3 credits) An exploration of the role of Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Cuban Americans, and other latinos in the U.S. through an investigation of exemplary literature, cinema, and music. While many of the texts are bilingual or in English, this course will be conducted entirely in Spanish. (NTW) 435 La versión de los vencidos (3 credits) In this course students will read texts written during the Spanish Conquest of the Americas. Those texts have either been written by Native Americans or by Spaniards who transcribed some of the most important and revealing texts or oral accounts of the natives from Central and South America. (NTW) 437 El caribe hispánico (3 credits) This course will focus on the intersection of race, class, gender and sexual belief and practice in the processes of colonialism in the Spanish speaking Caribbean. Through the study of contemporary literature we will examine how colonialism used constructions of sexuality to create political, cultural and social dynamics that have pervaded the lives of the colonized and the colonizer, and influenced the sensitivities, beliefs and perspectives of Western cultures and practices in general. (NTW) 440 El legado español en América Latina (3 credits) How does the past shape the present? How did the cultural and political legacies brought by the Spanish Conquistador shape Latin America? What remains of the deep roots from indigenous cultures and black slavery? Born in blood and fine, consecrated by the sword and the cross, Latin America, with a common past, presents today a myriad of contrasts and paradoxes. A variety of texts offering different points of view on the conquest, the colonization process and Latin American today will guide students to substantiate their own answers to these questions. (NTW) 489 Senior Project Seminar (1 credit) This 1-credit course in preparation for the Senior Project will give students the opportunity to begin work on their thesis topic. Through this class, students will prepare their statements of purpose, bibliographies (including annotated bibliographies), outlines, and various drafts of their thesis before signing up for SPAN 490. 490 Senior Project (3 credits) Required of all majors. A thesis or other appropriate work that demonstrates the student's proficiency in Spanish.